


open hand or closed fist

by mudfrog



Series: Dream SMP-verse [2]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Dialogue Heavy, Dream Smp, Dubious Ethics, M/M, Not-Really Traitor Dave | Technoblade, Surprise Kissing, The Festival (Dream SMP) Aftermath, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Villain Wilbur Soot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:33:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27146696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mudfrog/pseuds/mudfrog
Summary: In the aftermath of the Festival, Wilbur stands alone in the pit with nowhere to go. Techno intrudes.It stays in the pit.
Relationships: Dave | Technoblade/Wilbur Soot
Series: Dream SMP-verse [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1987528
Comments: 30
Kudos: 318





	open hand or closed fist

There are silverfish in the walls.

Wilbur scrapes the sharp end of his pick into the cracks, waiting for the tell-tale pitter-patter of scales, waiting for the barrage of rain. This far down in the caverns, rain doesn't reach Pogtopia. They're piled on dirt and stone and a vast expanse of space. What water leaking into the cracks have been stoppered with shambling cobblestone, but the Pit is a fresh wound, and it bleeds dark water at the soles of his feet.

There are cracks in the walls, the sound of rain is just out of reach.

"What’re you doin' over there?"

He turns in a frenzy. 

Technoblade stands a black figure in his heeled boots, and not nearly as silent. Adorned by blue shadows, he hovers between the gaping maw of the pit, his cloak soaked in orange light. How at home he looks, for a man who is barely present, cutting against the glamour of his old, crooked crown. Wilbur pulls himself from the eastern-facing wall, coming closer to peer at Techno’s face, wondering if there are lines of guilt. Weak spots he needs to root out. 

Techno's face is sallow, bone white.

There are violet bruises of fatigue under his eyes, but that's always been there. His fur complements him well, makes the razor edge softer. That Wilbur can touch what makes Technoblade without having his hand sliced open. A traitor to the rightful heir of L'Manburg. When he has it back, he will... 

"Technoblade," he says, airy. "Something on your mind?"

Techno’s eyes flicker behind him, stalling on the far end of the wall. His mouth opens, dragging on his words like choosing them as he speaks, "I would like to... explain myself."

He cocks his head, "Explain?" his pick hits the ground with a clean crack. "Oh, no, no, the _festival?"_ Two hours. "Technoblade, you're rehashing old news,"

The other man makes a sweet time of stepping into the pit, a thin hand curled against the archway as he drops down. The slide of his cloak dampened by his voice, "Wilbur," reproachful, entreating.

In a voice most solemn.

"You came here," Wilbur says, hearing his voice shake with sparking nerves, pulling his mouth to match. The smile is crass, the laugh tumbling out of his gasping throat even more. Irises track him like a needle point. "You told us exactly what you were going to do. It was on us for not believing you."

Techno allows him the touch to his shoulder, staring at the hand long and silent, and Wilbur doesn’t take it off from pure, vindictive spite alone. "Let me talk." Techno says. 

_Ooh, let me talk._

"You’re being serious, right now, Technoblade?" Wilbur cajoles, leaning in to smile, wonders if he can see the threaded gold running underneath Technoblade's cold, blue veins. Where is the laughter? He hears the laughter every time he closes his eyes, rasping, sees the line of Technoblade's silver-streaked smile. 

The Blade has always moved like a wraith, like the very air could fling him into the void in the sky. He wraps himself in blood, in pieces of ornate jewelry clinging to his clothes, the dents in his armour make lines of gold that resemble the rim of his glasses, summery furs that feather over his head. Wilbur has seen him grasp at his furs indulgently, press them against his cheek. The things that it make him larger than he is, the things that make the Blood God. 

Predator in a body sleep-starved, haunting the dark chambers of Pogtopia. 

"Talk." Wilbur murmurs, "You always do what you want."

Now, he stands so still, and so rigid, Wilbur thinks he'd turn to stone, a man made of more than threats, inconsequential things. 

"I regret very little about the festival." Technoblade says, so oddly, Wilbur is brought swiftly back to the Pit, the fingers he has pressed like a shackle on a tight shoulder. He watches the half-hearted mockery of a smile carved into Technoblade's face, and finds himself _almost_ satisfied.

He's not lost his intuition after all.

"I mean, I got what I needed." His voice is stilted, and Wilbur expects the thin laugh, punched out of Techno. Unwilling, or unable, to confront the wrongs he's done. 

He still knows _Techno,_ burrowed under the pomp and the airs.

The boy he grew up with stares at him, just barely as tall with help of his heels. The shadows hollow his eyes, where he tracks the way Wilbur tugs at the muddied curl of his collar. "I needed to know how strong their troops were,"

He lets out a breath, his voice is lighter, higher. He speaks quicker. "And I do now, we know that they’re _weak_." Doubt sleeps in the impenetrable mirror of his eyes. "So I don’t regret it- I mean, I do, regret. I regret that I spent so little time here with you, and Tommy. I miscalculated his fondness for Tubbo."

Wilbur watches the downcast of his eyes, his own head dipping mutely to catch it. Sweat dampens his palms. 

"I didn’t think his life would be a betrayal." Techno says, with a finality Wilbur suspects is only for himself. Eyes cut towards him.

_Ah._

"I would’ve brought this to Tommy, but he..."

"Tommy’s not very pleased with you at the moment," he muses, caked in buttery cheer.

The sharp line of Techno's jaw tightens, an adjustment to his shoulders. It is a sharp juxtaposition against the loose, languid line of his back, an affected ease he carries with the weight of his crown. It's difficult hiding, when Wilbur is so adamant on winning ground. He expects a quip now, to shore up support - it's what Technoblade does, finding cover - but Technoblade only takes a deliberate step backwards.

Doesn't brush Wilbur's hand off, not with enough vitriol, to shake him.

And Wilbur is too coiled, with the gnawing in his stomach, to be shaken.

"That was a pretty speech, Techno." he says.

Techno watches his approach with a dull resignation that is barely palpable. Whatever he seems to see in Wilbur's crinkled eyes, he's decided to weather.

"How long did you spend practicing it?"

"... an hour." Techno admits, some sort of relief tugging his mouth, wanting, wanting very hard to slip away.

“I’m glad you came to me, Techno.” he says. He draws Techno close, feel the chill that emanates from his skin. The smell of rain clings to him, dried hastily where he's squirreled himself away, away from Pogtopia. “If you said this to Tommy, well,” to the lilt of a warm ear, “He might’ve actually killed you.” 

A sharp huff of breath.

"I’m telling the truth,” Techno says, lean cut of his throat tense where Wilbur's curled his palm. It must be a great effort to be still like this, to let goosebumps trail in the wake of his fingers; Wilbur appreciates great efforts. “I don’t know what else to say, _you_ were watching me, _you_ never said anything, what else was I supposed to think, but that Tubbo was acceptable collateral-” 

Wilbur laughs. 

Techno suppresses the roll of his eyes too late.

He tightens his hand around warm flesh, and there is the press of cold, hard steel against his sternum.

"Don't push your luck, Wilbur," Techno intones.

Whatever paltry amicability has fallen away, and in the void of his voice is a threat.

He smiles.

"Y’know,” he says, friendly, relaxing his hold. Not all the way, not really, but enough that light returns behind Technoblade's glass eyes. "Tommy would be fucking pissed if he heard that, were you really going to say this to him?"

Techno blinks at him. His jaw is warm cupped in Wilbur’s hand. His pale lashes curl upwards when he grimaces, “Uh, it’s- the truth.” 

Wilbur clicks his tongue, like it is a very mournful thing. 

"But you gotta sell it," he whispers, "I’ll show you."

He kisses Techno like he wants to devour him. Presses into his mouth, and only surprise parts his lips. He takes the air from him with a vengeance, swallowing the quiet sound that slips out of Techno’s throat. He bites down on the startled retreat of tongue, shoves him against the wall with his teeth and waits for the clean end of a blade to run right through his gut. 

He opens his eyes.

The thoughts that flit by Techno's face are impossible to catch, settling like a stone in watery depths. He wipes at his mouth with the back of his arm, staring down at it. It’s a streak of red across his face, bruised enough to make him seem put off. 

“You’re shite at it too.” Wilbur spits, high off his own fear, running his tongue along the back of his teeth like it will get the copper out. “What the fuck Techno, I thought you’d know at least a little bit.” 

“We don't have to take this,” Techno says, as if talking to himself. Quietly, retreating into the bubble he returns to so often, to stare thoughtfully at the other end of the Pit. “Do we, chat?”

Wilbur crows his laughter, and it crashes into the walls like old-hanging stalactites

His hands sting when he touches Techno's cheeks, lightning only he can see, the thunder only he can hear. He crowds Techno to the corner, pressing closed-mouthed against his lips. Techno is still in his hands, and so Wilbur counts the seconds on his own.

The back of Techno's knuckles are reddened from the cold, they rub at his mouth when Wilbur lets him go. Movements clean and methodical when he unclasps the chain of his cloak. It falls warm at his feet and he drags Wilbur down as he goes. “It stays in the pit.” he says, as if commenting on the weather. 

Wilbur’s cheeks hurt, he’s been smiling for a long while. He doesn’t think he’s stopped. "You’re so- full of _shite."_ he says, Techno makes a half-hearted noise of disagreement when his joints smack stone.

Techno tugs at his thigh, distracted by the press of his boot against white furs.

“You don’t have to- you don’t have to do this.” he says, dipping his head to lean his forehead onto Techno's. The crown is smeared with prints, and Wilbur plucks it from him to toss. “Just _say_ it. Say you’re a traitor and I’ll stop.” 

Techno stares up at him, “I’m not a traitor.” 

Breathes out and his chest rises under the palm of Wilbur’s hand. His heartbeat is slow, and Wilbur waits with bated breath to feel it beat, just to make sure. He wonders if anyone else has seen the pale flush across Technoblade’s collar, into the dip of his throat. His skin is raised with scars, plucked and healed irregularly. He should stop strapping his armour on when he’s injured. 

Should stop running off. 

“You’re a liar,” he says, hushed into the silence, his ears straining, hoping to hear the heartbeat under him. Grasps him, makes it hard enough to hurt.

Uncertainty loosens the tight lines around Techno’s eyes. He pulls Wilbur down to kiss him on the jaw, shy, clumsy, it’s actually terrible. He pulls away, and Wilbur bites at his cheek to keep him still, turns to his mouth to eat him alive. Techno presses his lips together like he doesn’t need air to breathe, and so Wilbur fists his fingers through silken hair, pries him open, wet and sloppy. Presses him down into the fur, and it swallows Techno like a halo.

His cloak scrapes against his knees, vibrant, disappearing into cold cobble. 

Techno's breath rattles between them.

His cheeks are a ruddy red, unflattering against his gaunt complexion. Lack of breath, Wilbur thinks, and allows him to ruminate, drawing the curtain of his hair from his shoulders. Techno licks at his lips. "You believe me now, Wilbur?" he asks, there is nothing but the croak in his voice betraying his indifference, no plaintive cry.

He simply pulls at his sleeves, panting into Wilbur's mouth.

Allows the touch to the vulnerable arch of his neck.

"Why are you acting like this doesn't even matter?" Wilbur hisses through his teeth, sweat and spittle plastering hair to his cheek.

Techno draws him in with the distant look of his eyes.

"Because it doesn't," he murmurs, and his mouth is warm atop Wilbur's shuttered eyelids.

**Author's Note:**

> initially, explicit sex would have happened, but it didn't go well because there was no way to make techno do it. heres the line from the draft that made me switch track;
> 
> His cheek twitches when Wilbur snaps his hips. 
> 
> “You know you’re kinda bad at this.” He says.
> 
> hope u enjoyed!


End file.
